Donaldson v. Johnson’s Empirical Analysis
1962
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 2 district · 36 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 42 later decisions — most recently March 2024 · most notably 1 Ark. App. 75 - Andres v. Andres (1981), Seeco, Inc. v. Hales (2000)
2 federal appellate · 2 district · 36 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on Taylor v. McClintock · McCulloch v. Campbell · Pledger v. Birkhead · McEvoy v. Tucker · Petree v. Petree
Most-quoted passages
The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 42 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“‘ ‘ The test of mental competency to execute a deed is found in Petree v. Petree, 211 Ark. 654 , 201 S. W. 2d 1009 , where we quoted Pledger v. Birkhead, 156 Ark. 443 , 246 S. W. 510 , as the applicable rule in cases of this kind. ‘If the maker of a deed, will, or other instrument has sufficient mental capacity to retain in his memory, without prompting, the extent and condition of his property, and to comprehend how he is disposing of it, and to whom, and upon what consideration, then he possesses sufficient mental capacity to execute such instrument. Sufficient mental ability to exercise a reasonable judgment concerning these matters in protecting his oion interest in dealing with another is all the law requires. If a person has such mental capacity then, in the absence of fraud, duress, or undue influence, mental weakness, whether produced by old age or through physical infirmities, will not invalidate an instrument executed by him. McCulloch v. Campbell, 49 Ark. 367 , 5 S. W. 590 ; Seawel v. Dirst, 70 Ark. 166 , 66 S. W. 1058 ; Taylor v. McClintock, 87 Ark. 243 , 112 S. W. 405 ; McEvoy v. Tucker, 115 Ark. 430 , 171 S. W. 888 .’ [Emphasis added] The Pledger case was also quoted approvingly in Hunt v. Jones, 228 Ark. 544 , 309 S. W. 2d 22 . Even the doctors who testified that Mrs. Donaldson was mentally incompetent agreed that she could have lucid intervals. Since it is shown that Mrs. Donaldson had periods in which she was normal, it becomes a question as to her mental con”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.